IPL franchise Rajasthan Royals has partnered with the Board For Cricket Control In India (BCCI) to offer Sports Marketing Courses for all the players who have played in the IPL. The tie-up could well serve the interests of the cricketers in the long run equipping them with life skills which could come in handy to them post their retirement from the sport and help them out in taking up a second career option post cricket.

To kickstart the program, the National Cricket Academy (NCA) will fine tune and share a list of players who they deem will be keen to pursue the course and can benefit from it in the long run. Based on the course's feedback received from the first set of players, NCA, with the help of BCCI, will work with Rajasthan Royals to further extend this course to a larger group of past and present IPL players.

It will be a collaborative certification programme under Australia’s Deakin University & Deakin Co with National Cricket Academy preparing a list of all those who would undergo the course.

Speaking about the initiative, Jake Lush McCrum, Chief Operating Officer, Rajasthan Royals said: “We are extremely happy to be working with the NCA through BCCI to provide the Online Sports Marketing course to current and former IPL players on a complimentary basis.

“With many players still unable to practice and compete, we are delighted to offer them another way to stimulate their mind and develop a new set of skills, through this purely online course. We would love it if these courses inspired many of them to enter the sports industry when their cricket careers are over.”

New Zealand leg-spinner Ish Sodhi has already finished the course and is expected to help the RR franchise as and when the IPL kickstarts. England star Jos Buttler and India’s Jaydev Unadkat and Varun Aaron are also nearing completion of the course.